What can surprise you in the traditions of the Chukchi?

Many interesting things can be read about this popular people in the jokes. But domestic and foreign ethnographers and just travelers, first encountered with the life and customs of the Chukchi, were often shocked by some manifestations of their originality.

Many features of the Chukchi lifestyle are characteristic only for this people.

The first "swingers"

This is one of the strangest customs of the Chukchi, noticed in the 18th century by a Russian scientist with German roots, Karl Heinrich Merck. Merck explored the northeastern coast of Russia, studied the customs and way of life of many northern peoples, and left memories of this only published in the 19th century.

Relationships of the sexes, according to Merck, in the Chukchi were very peculiar - to consolidate comradely (business, partner) contacts, it was not forbidden to exchange wives. This ritual was called “ngövtumgyn” (which in translation means “friendship by wife”), and the narrow-eyed “swinger” - “ngövtumgyt”.A jealous Chukchi is like a Jewish reindeer herder: it was more offensive for representatives of this people not to give their wife to “Korefan”, than not to pay off debts. This interchange most often arose from purely practical considerations that simplified the life of this people in the difficult conditions of the Far North.

As a contemporary ethnographer and researcher of the Far North, Professor Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Sergey Alexandrovich Arutyunov, said, this practice existed before the Chukchi touched civilization, today such “free love” does not occur.

Karla Merka was also amazed by the custom of dressing the Chukchi shaman into women's clothing and his subsequent cohabitation (in domestic terms) with the owner of the yaranga as the second half of the marriage - as the spirits allegedly ordered. Also, the Chukchi practiced Levirate - the younger brother of the deceased older brother was obliged to marry his widow and raise all the children of the deceased, as his own.

Did not save the drowning

This rule, which was strictly observed by the Chukchi, actually took place, even in the twentieth century, confirms S. A. Arutyunov. Sergey Alexandrovich says that the pond was considered to be the boundary between the earthly and otherworldly worlds from this people - if spirits of water take a person, it is unacceptable to interfere.When the boats of the Chukchi turned over and their comrades found themselves in their rather heavy clothes in the water, none of the tribesmen was in a hurry to help.

But among the Eskimos, Arutyunov adds, there was no such cruel custom - it happened that they saved drowned Chukchi people, despite the fact that these peoples were not friends, to put it mildly.

Such "diapers" were only among them.

Karl Merck told in his notes about the unusual way of swaddling newborns in the Chukchi, which is essentially a primitive prototype of a modern diaper: moss and deer wool served as an absorbent material. The baby was dressed in a kind of jumpsuit with such a “lining” that repeatedly changed during the day.

It is noteworthy that this is not the only Chukchi invention from the list of those that were later updated. For example, the role of a sun visor (as in a baseball cap) in the Chukchi was played by a piece of whalebone attached to a hat — he protected from the bright and evil northern sun and blinding snow. Russian ethnographers have noticed that the Chukchi use peculiar “sunglasses” - eye-patch dressings made of tanned deerskin with narrow slits for review.“Cocktail tubules” also appeared in the Chukchi long before the appearance of mixed drinks - this people drank liquids through the hollow bones of animals: as you know, in the cold, if you touch the metal surface with your lips, you can “stick”.